The room was quiet and cold.
Although there were a man and a woman in an isolated space, there was none of the romantic spark going on.
Rather, it was about the upcoming danger that Lyra forewarned.
"Academy has, in total, thirty-five professors at the moment." Lyra spoke, "Forty is the standard. However, five were sent to the frontline. Today, with three professors of the second-year out, and one of them being Master Andrias whose skill offers the highest versatility of all, suggests a hole in its security."
"Are you saying that I was manipulated into informing the professors?"
Lyra shook her head to Isaac's words.
"No, all of this is purely coincidental. I don't have specific details on what you discovered or what the professors are dealing with, but I am confident of my statement."
Time was ticking.
"What did you see?" Isaac then asked, referring to the future that she read.
"Three in number. Wearing black tights. Two men and one woman based on appearances. They have masks that offer full face coverage." Lyra's silver eyes glowed mystically as she replied.
"Skills?"
"Gas… first man emits gas—presumably C-rank: [Smog Expulsion]. Second man creates a body double—C-rank: [Doppleganger]. The woman has C-rank: [Reinforcement]."
"Enclosed space is not ideal." Isaac concluded. He then stared at her in silence, before finally asking a question that has been irking in his mind for quite some time, "What is it that you are after, Lyra?"
"…What do you mean?"
"The best means of dealing with this situation is to make a loud announcement that can reach other residents of the dorm. This will prevent the approach of the assaulters without putting yourself at risk."
Lyra didn't answer immediately. She looked at Isaac intently with her eyes glowing—as if she was foreseeing Isaac's response.
"As I already said, they are wearing masks and black tights. Skills aren't exclusive to one; there are multiple owners of those C-rank skills." She explained, "Just with my [Clairvoyance] alone, I cannot figure out their identities. Their identities need to be secured because the only ones who may target you in this Kingdom are…"
She held out two fingers,
"Either the radicals of House Valerius, the Order of Acacia, or… the operatives of Solari Empire."
Isaac paused. The first part of her phrase stuck in his mind.
The radicals of House Valerius.
He remembered his sabotaged wands. Those training wands, crafted via the skill named B-rank: [[Water Shot] Wand Craft], were the main business owned by the Valerius household. He then remembered Atticus, who was hired to disqualify him during the Mechanism Room.
The bounty poster indicated that those two whom I discovered are the operatives of the Solari Empire. Professors confirmed that.
Could it be that all these events are linked somehow?
House Valerius… does it have connections to the Solari Empire?
"Should your eventual assaulters be affiliated to the Solari Empire, it suggests that the state of our Kingdom is much worse than what it suggests. I need to get to the bottom of this." Lyra continued, cutting Isaac off from his own thoughts. "Therefore, I am using you as a bait. I am sorry about this."
"Then so be it."
Isaac stood up and opened the door to the exit, signalling that the conversation was over.
"I too am curious of their identities."
He was sick and tired of remaining in the dark, being reactive instead of proactive.
…
The dorm's garden was on the Golden Repose's eastern side.
It was a narrow strip of maintained greenery before the building's outer wall, accessible through the ground floor's side exit.
At this night, it was empty and silent. With just moonlight and ambient light from the building's exterior mana-lamps providing visibility, those whose sight isn't attuned to darkness would suffer.
"Why here?" Lyra asked. She tapped her fingers once. "You asked me to follow you."
Within one minute. They are behind us.
"You visited me for a question. This is the best place for the answer."
In the darkness, Lyra's features weren't as clear. If enemies were tailing them from their back, they weren't looking at her face but her back.
They didn't know that it was Lyra who was talking with Isaac. They probably wouldn't have assumed that the very Princess of the Aetherion Kingdom would be Isaac Nameless either, given his reputation. Thus, they will attack with confidence… at least based on what Lyra informed him.
It was bizarre. The fact that they were willing to go this extent to eliminate him meant something else. It meant that they viewed him as a threat that must immediately be taken care of.
Isaac raised his hand.
Evaporation.
The garden's vegetation was already providing elevated level of moisture.
He worked with what was there, evaporating the existing water to elevate the humidity the air around the garden's center. It wasn't at the same level of saturation as the central park's fountain, but sufficient nonetheless.
The mana-bird was gone. No monitoring infrastructure. Whatever happened here would be recorded only by the two people present and whatever they chose to report afterward.
Then, they appeared.
Three figures, the same masked and dark-clothed presentation Lyra had described. They had tracked the movement from the room—the open door, the side exit, the garden—with the competence of people who had planned for multiple locations rather than one.
Lyra said that she saw Isaac getting injured. That was before her involvement. It meant that the battle, in her premonition, occurred within his room—the enclosed space.
The fact that they were currently in garden meant that their plan A had already failed. The future of him getting injured no longer existed.
There was no talk as the first man's hands opened.
Those hands emitted a substantial volume of smog. However, the garden's open air and the humidity that Isaac further upregulated created the interference that prevented its orderly advance and accelerated dispersion.
C-rank: [Smog Expulsion]. Just as Lyra indicated.
The first man paused, not having expected such behavior out of smog.
By then, Isaac had a dense waterdrop, deionized, rapidly rotating under his fingertip, hidden from the enemies.
He then shot it at the ground ahead of him. The droplet landed, and splattered into multiple directions upon collision due to its rotation and lack of friction. The water spread, and one landed right above the foot of the woman who was running toward them.
The woman slipped as her heel contacted the micro-puddle of deionized water. Her movement was momentarily impeded.
"Second man left, preparing the double," Lyra said from behind him, her voice at the register of someone spending [Clairvoyance] carefully.
The second man "split" into two as he ran.
C-rank: [Doppleganger].
Two identical-looking men ran toward Isaac and Lyra. Running parallel to one another, their movement mimicked each other in a perfect, unnatural manner.
Isaac took out an iron charm. Held his finger, which held a dense droplet, against the sharp edge of the charm. Fired it. The droplet split into two mid-flight, upon contacting the charm's sharp edge. Two split arc of water struck two men simultaneously, with their density moderate enough to knock them back.
This wasn't the end.
"First man, another round of smoke," Spoke Lyra.
Flipping the charm back into his pocket, he turned, moving his hand in a manner he has been practicing for the past six days, to generate a water veil.
The wide stream of smog struck the water veil. Given the density of the veil, it was smog that lost its momentum and dispersed.
"Woman, dashing just beyond the smog."
Hearing Lyra, Isaac snapped his fingers.
[Condensation]. Atmospheric Density Lock.
Beneath the smog, a hand shot out. The woman was in their proximity in an instant, before she abruptly stopped as the moisture around the air, surrounding her, suddenly became denser by abnormal degree—enough to stop her momentum.
Lyra acted, landing her heel straight into the exposed abdomen of the woman. The woman was knocked back, although based on her reaction, she managed to evade an injury by managing [Reinforcement] on the area of impact just in time.
Just then, Isaac fired a dense, rotating droplet, straight at the woman who didn't expect it. It hit her on the shoulder that wasn't under the protection of [Reinforcement]. It drilled into the flesh. The woman cried in pain as she held the site of injury that generated a bruise.
"Second man from the right. His doppelganger from the left."
Isaac turned to right. Lyra turned to left. Back to back, they faced the approaching enemies from two different directions.
Isaac saw something shining from the man's grasp.
A metal? Weapon shouldn't be allowed.
[The Prism] read with precision, the trajectory path of the knife in the man's right hand. Isaac, with calmness, took out his iron charm for the second time.
With a metallic clang, the iron charm clashed against the knife. The man looked surprise as he took a step back.
Lyra, with trained proficiency, managed to subdue the doppelganger with a martial art technique.
Isaac raised his finger. His mana thread within his Manafold Circuitry continued to accelerate.
[Condensation].
The dense droplet struck the man. The doppelganger dispelled.
"First man," Stated Lyra. Isaac, already having expected it this time around, turned to face the smog.
Water veil. Yet another successful block.
The second man and woman were both down. The smog briefly surrounded Isaac and Lyra.
Isaac generated another droplet, daring to fire it through the smog. He had the rough idea of where the first man was located.
However, he then stumbled, putting a pause to his attack.
Isaac looked down and found an abnormal bump on the ground the interrupted him.
"They…" Then, Lyra paused. Her body suddenly relaxed. Her silver eyes glowed brilliantly in darkness. "Retreated."
"Already?"
The smog cleared. It was as she said. There was no sight of enemies.
"You… just dealt with three C-rank skills with F-rank: [Condensation] alone." Lyra shook her head, "Of course they'd run. You are a variable that they can't predict."
"Or," Isaac suggested, "They noticed that they are against A-rank: [Clairvoyance], and deduced that their chance of victory is slim."
"I'd argue that my claim is more grounded based on how the interaction went." Lyra then looked around. Released a breath, before sighing, "It looks like we didn't manage to uncover their identities."
The bump.
His eyes narrowed at a particular change that [The Prism] captured.
"The earth."
Lyra's eyes followed where his gaze was headed. She furrowed her eyebrows, "I don't notice anything different."
"Its surface is irregular. A significant change from the terrain just before." Isaac deduced, "Earth-based skill. It made me stumble and prevented me from firing my shot, while the smog muffled sound."
"Earth…?" Lyra stiffened. "That means… House Terra—"
Just then, the Golden Repose's upper windows began to produce light.
From above, voices. Footsteps. The guards' directional urgency descending through the building.
Isaac stood in the garden's center. The humidity he had raised was still present, dispersing slowly.
He looked at where the first man had been standing. At the fracture line in the garden stone, visible now in the mana-lamp light, running parallel to the building's wall.
Lyra was beside him when the first guard came through the side exit.
"I-Is everything alright?! We received that students were getting attacked!"
"Yes, we are fine."
She had the composed expression she always had, her hands folded, the [Clairvoyance] brightness gone from her eyes and replaced with the steady silver that was simply her.
"Three intruders," she said, to the guard. "They just ran off. They've been gone for approximately forty seconds."
The guard looked at the wall. At the garden. At the fracture in the stone, which he noted without understanding.
He called for the others.